York challenges the Government

Labour has called on the Chancellor, George Osborne, to allocate York’s rejected council tax freeze funding towards the dualling of York’s northern section of outer ring road.

The council’s Labour Leader has said Labour would seriously consider match-funding this £1.8m to see improvements along the stretch of outer ring road.

Labour Leader of City of York Council, Coun. James Alexander, said:

“Long term aspirations for dualling sections of York’s northern ring road and other traffic alleviation measures would give a significant boost to the economy and combat congestion. This £1.8m could be put towards kick-starting this process.

“Council finance officers have confirmed if we took the Government’s ‘buy now pay later’ council tax freeze money, it would mean £2.2m extra cuts over the next two years, or an even larger 4.5% council tax increase next year, with a further £300k cuts this year.

“This is clearly not a good deal for York. The money would be better off spent kick-starting improvements to York’s northern ring road.”